


to hell with the consequence

by forpeaches (bluecarrot)



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, Declarations Of Love, F/M, Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, Idiots in Love, Love Confessions, Modern Era, Unrequited Love, an optimistic ending at least, car in need of repair, i dont even know what to tag this, no one ever has turned down a horny Jaime Lannister, well i think it’s optimistic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:53:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27890095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/forpeaches
Summary: She hasn’t been taking his phone calls, and Jaime knows why.
Relationships: Hyle Hunt/Brienne of Tarth, Jaime Lannister & Brienne of Tarth, Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth
Comments: 17
Kudos: 171





	to hell with the consequence

**Author's Note:**

> 05 December 2020.

Across the street, a door opens and a man goes through it. He pauses a moment on the porch — backlit, all shadow — he’s talking.

A woman comes out. Kisses him. A gentle shove: go.

And Hyle leaves.

And Jaime gets up off the curb.

She hasn’t been taking his phone calls. Three days of silence, three days since her car broke down and they ended up pushing it nearly half a mile to the nearest station —

“I’ll call you a tow.”

“I don’t want you wasting your money. It isn’t very far.”

“I’ll call Tyrion,” he’d teased, “and _he_ will send a town car, and the _driver_ will call a truck for you—”

She’d wiped the hair out of her forehead, looking irritable. “Are you too posh to push, Lannister?”

“Now that you mention it, this is a fresh manicure.” He examined his nails. “Damn, I already need a fill.”

“Come on. Help me. Put those pretty muscles to good use.”

So they got it rolling and took turns in the driver’s seat, steering the ugly hunk of trash Brienne loved so much, and right there on the last long straightway before the mechanic’s shop, dusty and sweating and laughing at each other, — then the skies opened.

Either there was no warning rumble or they didn’t hear it, because both of them stood a moment like they’d never known rain before. Brienne looked both horrified and horrible, a drowned rat in blue jeans and a cheap race-day tshirt; she didn’t seem to think the downpour any good reason to take a break; she only set her jaw and put her back into the work again.

Jaime refused to help. “It’s fucking raining,” he said, yelling over the noise. “Go in the fucking car and we’ll wait it out.”

“The shop is right there!” she said.

“You’ll get soaked!”

“I’m already soaked!”

“It is cold, it is raining, — go wait in the car.”

“No! Look, if you’re not going to help me—”

And Jaime kissed her.

He had no excuse for it at all, really, except that he wanted to do it so much. He might well have spent years wanting to do this to Brienne. Thinking of it. Dreaming.

The reality was better.

Her mouth opened under his; her cheeks were hot against his hand; the rain sluiced between them. Fire and ice, and she was pressed up against him, he had one hand on her neck and the other on her waist, sliding up her body, and the shiver she gave had nothing at all to do with the rain.

Then she pulled away. “Get in the car,” she said.

Jaime stood dumb. Numb. “I only—”

 _“Get in the car,”_ she said.

So he did.

She answered the phone that night when he called. “I love you,” he said, in reply to her rather more businesslike “Tarth residence.”

Even over the line he heard her stiffen. “Jaime—”

“I needed to say that first. You needed to hear it.”

Silence. “You know I’m dating Hyle.”

“Gods, still?”

“Yes,” she said, dry. “Still. Nothing has happened in the three hours since I saw you to change that status.”

“He’s so _boring.”_

“Don’t say that. Hyle is fine. He’s perfectly ...”

“Boring. Dull.”

“He’s fine. He’s decent. He’s _normal_. He doesn’t feel the need to grab me in the middle of the road and make a passionate romantic gesture.”

“That’s what I’m — You’re _better_ than this. Than him. You can do better.”

“Yeah? And who would that be?” she said: he had never heard her sound so tired. “You’re not in love with me. You’re only dramatic.”

“I love you,” he said again. “I do. You don’t understand.”

“Stop it, will you?”

“I won’t.”

“Please. Or I’ll hang up. It’s been a l-long day. I need to rest.”

“Tell me you love me.”

“I told you, I don’t want to talk about—”

“Tell me you _don’t_ love me, then. Tell me you don’t care, that you didn’t feel anything when I kissed you, that you haven’t been burning for me for months. Years. Say it,” he said, “and I’ll leave you alone.”

Silence.

Waiting, Jaime tasted bile.

“Fine.” Brienne’s voice was different than he’d ever heard it — harder. “I love you. Is that what you want to hear? I love you and I think about you all the time. I love you so much it hurts and I want, I — I want you. I want you. I want you so goddamned much. And none of that means shit because we would be absolutely terrible together.”

“Brie—”

“We’re _friends,_ Jaime. We work as friends, we’re good as friends. We’re safe that way. If we —”

She stopped.

“If what?”

“If we were lovers,” she said

— and he heard now how she formed that word, _lovers_ ; how she had kept it and held unto it, saved it for them. She’d never said that about Hyle. She would never say it, no matter what presumptions Hunt made on her body —

— “We would burn one another. Like a wildfire. It would be awful. An awful mess. We’d destroy each other.”

“A bonfire,” he said. “It would be so bright.” He could still taste her, feel her. The quick motion of her breath; her hips against his. “Brienne. Please don’t do this.”

“Don’t call me again,” she said: and hung up.

Jaime hadn’t listened. He’d called her a dozen times in a row or more, until she took the phone off the hook — and then he called again, every five minutes, til the sun rose up and he shut his eyes.

  
Three days.

She loved him. That’s all he believed.

When Hyle leaves the house, Brienne shuts the door behind him — and Jaime, heart in his hand and the now-familiar taste of sickness in his mouth, — Jaime goes to the door and knocks

and Brienne lets him in.

**Author's Note:**

> all of this story is true and half of it really happened.
> 
> *
> 
> as unlikely as it seems, this is entirely in response to me remembering the existance of a Melissa Etheridge song
> 
> “lover, i burn; let me in”


End file.
